By Mike Mount with reporting from Chris Lawrence, Suzanne Kelly and Pam Benson

A CIA officer was among those killed in Afghanistan in a suicide attack that also killed an American soldier, according to a U.S. official.

The attack, which occurred Saturday in southern Kandahar province, also killed four Afghan National Security troops, according to a U.S official with knowledge of the details of the attack.

The attack is believed to have been a case of an Afghan security force member attacking his own forces, the official said.

News of the attack trickled out Wednesday with no official announcement detailing it.

Only the name of the soldier who was killed has been released: Army Spec. Brittany B. Gordon, 24, of St. Petersburg, Florida. Gordon was assigned to the 572 Military Intelligence Company, 2nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division, Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington.

The announcement of her death came in a Department of Defense news release on Monday, but it offered no details of the attack, saying only that she died of "wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked her unit with an improvised explosive device."

The CIA declined to comment on the report of the death of an agency employee, but a second U.S. official identified the officer as a male.

The U.S. officials said the incident appears to be an insider attack because the bomber was wearing the uniform of the National Directorate of Security, the Afghan government's intelligence service. The bomber struck while the group was on patrol, according to one official.

"Insider attack" is the term used by the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force for Afghan forces attacking allied or other Afghan troops.

A third U.S. official said ISAF is looking into the suicide bombing in southern Afghanistan to determine whether it was an insider attack because it is not clear if the attacker was really a member of the National Directorate of Security.

The official, who has knowledge of the bombing, also had little detail about the attack, but said it occurred near a bazaar in the town of Maruf, located less than 100 miles east of the city of Kandahar.

The officials gave differing numbers on the wounded, ranging from four to eight U.S. and Afghan troops.

soundoff(69 Responses)

One thing is for sure . Which is that inspite of all the facts Obama still feels that some kind of worthwhile workable alliance can be able to be worked oput the Karai goverment and the Taliiban. How unrealistic can he be ? For the Taliban have proven time and time again by their own actions that they are a group of ruthless thugs with no honor and would only keep their word in anything that they might promise only as long as it would suite them as no longer.
It would be a good idea for the people in the Karzai goverment to heed the wisdom Sun Tzu in THE ART OF WAR. Which teaches "We cannot enter into an alliance with neighboring princes until we are acquainted with their designs." To put this in a more current and updated way, it may be said that "We cannot enter into an alliance with the Taliban ubtil we are acquainted with their designs." With the Taliban we all may be sure that their intentions are evil.

the killers come from pak and then run back and hide in the ISI quarters..just like osama.....unless pak is siolated and ISI eradicated this menace wont end and peace wont return to the region.....pakis encourage this violence cos if there is peace then who will feed their begging bowls...once pak is taken care of everything will be peaceful....

john kennedy, for all off his shortcomings...and he had many of them..once remarked before he ignored his own advice and initiated a quagmire which ultimately resulted in the senseless deaths of 59000 ameircans (mostly of minorities), that "we are 6 % of the world's population. Who are we to impose our will on the other 94% of mankind" Trying to do that seems to be the guiding principle of our foreign policy sense...Lets face it...Obama and Romney are on the same page with respect to war..both are pro war and are willing to accept, with no discussion, based on 400 deaths per year, which seems to be the average Obama is willing to accept, another 800-1000 deaths at the hands, not only of the guerillas, but of our aghani 'allies' also, before he withdraws in by the end of 2014–and, if you believe that, I have a bridge you might also be itnerested in buying...the press has been giving the Obama war machine a free ride for 4 years, as 2 1/2 times more American lives have been wasted than in the 8 years of the moron who preceded him...they are both worthless..

Geen:The casualties were not mostly of minorities,most casualties in the Vietnam War were Caucasian,but a disproportional number of minorities were drafted to fight in that war given their numbers of the U.S.population.Let's just say if you were poor of any race,you were likely to be drafted by the Selective Service for military duty.Your statement is quite irrelevant,for they were all "Americans"..Their headstones don't list race,and under fire they all blended into a fighting force to fight for each other regardless of race.

This war will never end because it is so profitable for the international bankers who own the US Congress. If you're sick of the current state of our country then the patriotic thing to do would be to support devolution of the government into smaller pieces. In other words – SECESSION from the tyranny in D.C.

I agree, to an extent... The U.S. always takes it too far as the world's police. But the countries that we attempt to help either hate us for going in or resent us for sitting out. The U.S. has the capabilities to intervene and should always flex those muscles, but is to quick to use its military. The U.S. should shift its interventionism policy to one of humanitarian supply and intel gathering rather than instant use of force.

We could but it seems every time we do, there are more that come at us. I hate to say it but I don't think we can win this war. You can win a war against people so willing to die. They don't care about dying because life is so bad there.

Many times I have heard the war in the muslim lands compared to Vietnam. This is the wrong comparison. The correct comparison is to the Soviet war in Afghanistan. A superpower assumes they can roll in and take control of a country that is not materially wealthy, but has a proud history and culture and will not easily knuckle under to any foe, even a technologically superior one. The war drags on for years as the locals prove surprisingly resilient, and the corrupt opportunists who hitch themselves to the foreign power alienate the populace. As inefficiencies pile one on top of the other, as the constant drip-drip of material and psychological drain continues, it exposes the domestic affairs of the invading superpower. Economic problems become apparent. Deep structural problems with its political and financial systems begin to assert themselves, but they run so deep and are so ingrained in the very makeup of the superpower that they cannot be easily remedied. By the time they are actually addressed, the remedies are such a shock to the system that they shake the very core of the society in question, causing massive sea changes at every level. The superpower is forced to leave Afghanistan in disgrace. Less than five years later, the entire political and economic system of the nation in question collapses.

It's happening to y'all right now and the only way the parallels could be more obvious is if Obama had a big ol birthmark on his forehead. It's too late to stop it now. The question you should be asking is, will America even exist in its current state by the time the next election comes around? The Soviets knew they had problems, but none of them saw the end coming in the way it did, the pundits everywhere were shocked. Less than five years after the USSR left Afghanistan, it ceased to exist...how long will America last?

They are helping us, the very same way we helped them there in the 80's, harhar! The usa is being attacked by the VERY Islamists they trained and armed to FIGHT THE RUSSIANS, harharhar! You can't make this stuff up! The usa practically created the entire Militant Islamist movement the world knows today. In very like manner it was the usa and france that proliferated nuclear weapons and technology to Isreal creating the nuclear arms race in the region. ALL these messes are from the shortsighted vision of american imperialism. Who kidnaps and tortures? The usa. Who has military bases and 'black prisons' surrounding the globe? The usa. Who extra-judiciously orders assassinations that kill thousands upon thousands of innocent lives? The usa. Who feels they can invade any country at will in the name of 'protecting interests'? The usa. Sorry folks, but across the span of a single generation America has fallen to levels of immorality and degeneration usually reserved for dictatorships and bannana republics.

October 18, 2012 at 7:21 am |

indep100

Russia is helping the USA. When we went back into Afghanistan in 2001 we joined the side that the Russians supported. The communists were the ones who were fighting to let women go to school. It was the radical Islamists who opposed them and the US supported the radical Islamists including the jihadists like Osama bin Laden. The US now had airbases in what used to be the USSR and Russia allows the USA to overfly its territory to fly supplies and troops to Afghanistan.

October 18, 2012 at 8:58 am |

AgrippaMT

No need to shed a tear over the death of the CIA mercenary thug, but do shed a couple for the poor girl who was standing by probably as his bodyguard. Our military forces in Afghanistan and elsewhere should bluntly inform these CIA goons that they are totally on their own from now on, and need to provide for their own security. No doubt, corrupt firms like Blackwater, now operating under different names, will be glad to provide it for an appropriately extortionally high fee.

The Arabs predicted when we came into the ME that their land would be the graves of our young men, the cream of crop, in a war that's not a war and it's slowly coming true. Not one of young men are worth a crop of our youngs blood. Get out while the gettings good.

Christians concerned as rightwing factions splinter to form militant outfits.
PUNE, India, October 29 (CDN) — After more than a decade of severe persecution, India’s Christian minority is growing increasingly concerned over the mushrooming of newer and deadlier Hindu extremist groups.

Gone are the days when Christians had to watch out only for the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (World Hindu Council) and its youth wing, Bajrang Dal, which are closely linked with the most influential Hindu extremist umbrella organization, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). With voter support faltering for the RSS’s political wing, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), moderate and extremist sections within the Hindu nationalist movement are blaming each other, and militant splinter groups have emerged.

There's no such thing as nonviolent major religion. Even the one considered the least militant, Buddhism, has shown its dark side in history, and is still showing. The whole caste system is a source of constant grief, misery and injustice for millions of people, for example.

October 18, 2012 at 2:24 am |

Saiko

Correction: the caste system I mention was meant to be related to Hinduism, not Buddhism, in my post. Though caste system itself came into Hinduism FROM Buddhism.

October 18, 2012 at 2:25 am |

stambo

Yeah, like those brutal back and forth slaughters between muslims and hindi's never happened. I've written many times that once the west falls and people stop hearing about the muslim/jew/christian attrition the worlds attention will be drawn to the centuries old conflict between the 1.2 billion indians and the 1.5 billion chinese. Sooner than later the 'white' issues of the world will be replaced with more important indigenous issues.

October 18, 2012 at 7:33 am |

rk ny

hahaha..poor frustrated paranoid pakis...keep making comments ,ike this and prove ur stupidity..the world is laughing at you..hahahhahhaa

We should have *never* had invaded Afghanistan. Osama bin Laden was terminated with special forces based on smart intelligence (CIA can be smart. Sometimes.). Invading Iraq and Afghanistan was a totally STUPID thing to do, which helped destroy our economy, was based on WH lies, was essentially immoral and was ultimately useless.

Poor girl, lost her life because nasty old men with erection problems sent her to death.

Robert: It's a tragedy that anyone was killed. My condolences to the families.

However, your comment reflects a neanderthal-type mentality. Women, especially Intelligence Specialists (like SPC Gordon) are just as qualified as their male counterparts to fight, analyze information, and defend the nation. Indeed, they belong there.

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